ESR AR 2019 EN

advanced markets such as Japan and South Korea. We leverage our knowledge and experience to introduce such best practices and ideas to emerging markets to foster development of sustainability concepts in their industries. Outlook – 2020 and Beyond The challenges facing global business in 2020 are considerable – COVID-19, the continued trade tensions, US elections and more. The global outbreak of COVID-19, in particular, has brought about new dynamics and unquestionable uncertainties. First, I have been incredibly inspired by how the ESR team has rallied around the region in support of their fellow colleagues, customers, capital partners and other key stakeholders. The senior leadership team, led by Stuart and Jeffrey, very quickly made the wellbeing and safety of all of our stakeholders our top priority and appropriate measures were put in place to ensure so. ESR will remain steadfast in its focus to deliver for its employees, customers and especially for its local communities impacted by COVID-19. On the business side, we are beginning to witness accelerated structural changes in buying habits (as more goods are purchased online) and at the same time a decision by many retailers and manufacturers to revisit the “just-in-time” inventory model and add greater levels of inventory locally in each of their markets. The combination is driving businesses to modernise, improve and expand their logistics facilities and capabilities. At ESR, we strive to support the business needs of our customers and capital partners across the region. We believe that Asia Pacific is really well positioned, underpinned by positive long-term demographic and economic trends, which put the logistics sector on a course for outsized long-term growth. We are confident that our platform scale, business model and deep expertise position us exceptionally well to ride numerous favourable trends that underpin the performance of the industry’s most resilient and sought-after asset class. We see our entrepreneurial spirit, vision and execution capabilities playing an important role in managing the turbulent market conditions and tapping into the long-term growth potential for logistics infrastructure in Asia Pacific. ESR’s ongoing success will be driven by our asset-light, client-centric and e-commerce focused approach. “ “ Dongguan Machong Logistics Centre, Dongguan, China 16 Focused